Arco's Angel

For the first time, the seasoned musician seemingly had no recourse. His long time friend,

bassist Rek Mohr, had moved on to join the band

HURT and was touring the country on a record that

Michael had recently produced. Roberts was left home alone with what appeared to be a very bleak future. "Starting over in music is not an ideal

situation, and those were dark times."

Things would eventually get worse before better, so much so that Michael chose to pour his feelings into music, recording a series of instrumental tracks from the dark seclusion of his Missouri home. One after another, the tracks took shape

and solidified into several ideas, which he would soon show Rek. Having heard the tracks, Rek approached Hurt's singer, J. Loren, to see if he could suggest any vocalists for them. The fully produced tracks were sent to J., and then subsequently on to prospective singers.

Months went by and each vocalist Roberts contacted fell through. After a friendly follow up

call from J., plans started to change. "Michael was

far too talented to be sitting at home doing

nothing," so J. made it his personal prerogative to find Roberts a voice that would finish his songs. "I offered to write lyrics and melodies for a couple of the tunes in the hopes of making the job of getting his band going again easier." Michael agreed and at Pointfest, the last date of HURT's tour, Michael picked him up and the two headed to his home. "I made fresh pasta and home made sauce to lure him in. I knew it was going to be fantastic, and it is."

The tracks were mixed, used as an example, and gained some interest almost immediately, but still they failed to yield Michael a permanent singer. So, when J.'s next tour ended, he would call Roberts only to find that their hopes had not yet been realized. It was then that they decided to finish together what they had started. J. flew to St. Louis and set about poring over the arrangements that Michael had produced. "I began to look forward to working on his stuff more and more because it gave me a different set of challenges and liberties that I am not afforded in my own."

Over the course of several weeks, the pair would go on to track and record vocals over an entire album. Early on, "Life's Love Loss" became the record's theme as well as its title. And after completing the finishing touches, Michael and J. chose one project name each and both agreed... Arco's Angel could not have come at a better time.